Faith, and Community Leadership in Haiti (Part 1)
Faith in Haiti: Vodou, Catholicism, and Protestantism
By Hyppolite Pierre
Two communities occupied Saint-Domingue (present day Haiti), during colonial time, one larger than the other: the slaves and the slave-owners. The larger and destitute community of slaves cultivated the land for the smaller community of plantation owners, and made St. Domingue the proud jewel of France. The maintenance and survival of that colonial structure for more than a century, lied in the strength of the institutions as conceived and applied by the white colonial Masters, and the physical and spiritual strength of the slaves as their "African-ism" helped them sustain through the harshness of inhumane life. Part of that "African-ism" was the faith in Vodou, which eventually became a mélange of Catholicism (religion of the white masters), and their own religious experiences in Africa.
Vodou sealed the faith of that community of African slaves, and made them feel like a whole in this new land. When life on the land was too harsh as it usually was, it is thanks to their drawing from these religious beliefs that the African slaves would recapture their humane identity. It is also thanks to that faith that they kept believing in the possibility to regain their common humanity. That task was first taken by a runaway slave, Makandal, who acquired legendary status through his ruthlessness, and his willingness to do whatever it takes to free other slaves in the colony. His terrifying campaign against the white colonizer did not end colonialism at the time of his struggle. Nonetheless, it left an indelible mark in the psyche of other slaves, since his example of rebellion and fight for freedom was later followed by other leaders of the pre-independence period.
Vodou and the first community leaders in Haiti, then Saint-Domingue
The first experiences with community leadership in Haiti began during the time of slavery, when Haiti was called St.-Domingue. It was with the slaves who were still attached to their former land in Africa where many of them used to live in greater freedom. It was also with the colonial masters with their own religion and faith, and desire to either replicate a French-like life in the colony, and/or return to France after having amassed enough fortune as land owners or plantation managers. Thus would develop two different but yet intertwined Haiti.
The slaves did not have the colonizers' choices and therefore tried to find solace in their own African faith, which eventually got mixed with their master's religion, Catholicism. Vodou was borne out of that mixture, with its hierarchy of priests and priestesses called Houngan and Mambo , lwa , bókó , medsen fèy etc. Community leadership in the slaves' environment evolved from that experience, as a Houngan for instance who is a Vodou priest was also a healer, who at times can play the role of a counselor in his community of deprived slaves. The Vodou faith was then a well-established system, with great practical importance in the colonial structure. If for instance the white masters could afford or would rely on doctors trained in Hippocrates' medicine, the slaves would have to rely on their own medicine based on empirical knowledge acquired in the forests and rich lands of Africa, or in their new home in St.-Domingue. The slaves on the plantations with spiritual and pragmatic knowledge based on the Vodou faith would thus become their peers' first community leaders in St.-Domingue.
Haiti's First Community Leaders
This is where the first heroes of Haiti's independence would eventually come from as well. From Makandal to Boukman and many others, all leaders of that movement had the reputation to have either been a servant of that faith, or to have at least been protected by it. It was an important element in the slaves' community as it is still today among the free men and women of Haiti. A portrayal of the first heroes of Haiti's independence will perhaps show the relationship between Vodou and community leadership in Haiti.
If there was any doubt about the value of Vodou in Haiti's community leadership, Makandal provided the proof. Not only is he considered a revolutionary leader, but also to this day there are Vodou groups that are named directly after him, Makanda.
François Makandal was a Haitian bókó who from 1751 to 1757, terrified the French colonizers in Saint-Domingue with bands of runaway slaves known as maroons. Hiding in the colony's mountains and forests, he and his group stepped out mostly at night to find food and kill colonizers on their plantation. He was a legend in the slaves' community and is now recognized as one of the first rebels against the colonization of Haiti.
Makandal's tactics were ruthless, as he communicated his hatred towards the colonizers and the entire system of slavery through murder. He was a community leader from the perspective that he convinced other slaves in the community, mostly those in the Northern region of the country, to join him in the first reported organized struggle of the Haitian people to freedom.
What makes Makandal important as a community leader in Haiti is more than just his personal appeal or magnetism. It is also his skillful use of important elements in Vodou to give him a kind of stature that many leaders would not mind enjoying. He was not just an earthly leader, but one with supernatural powers acquired from the dear Gods of Africa where he and his companions came from. For a whole six years, he terrified the colonizers until he was caught and killed in 1758 by the French. The vivid memory of his struggle for freedom that he left behind are counted and recounted in most Haitian history books. What enhanced further his stature as a leader were the circumstances that surrounded his death by execution. According to popular account, the stake used by the French in Cap Français (present day Cap-Haïtien) to burn him snapped during the execution. This occurrence left in the minds and souls of those slaves and maroons the indelible stamp of the worthiness of their cause. The Vodou gods were on their side, so they thought.
Thirty-four years later, another leader of Haiti's first revolution would rise. Known as Boukman, he would pick-up where Makandal left off. In mid-August of 1791, Boukman would invite rebellious slaves at a Vodou ceremony in Bois-Caïman, in the North near Cap-Français. There, he sealed the faith of what would later become the Haitian people. During what is now regarded as a significant historical ceremony, he had a pig killed and asked every participant to drink from its blood, as a way to initiate them to the struggle for freedom from the French slave-owners. Better organized than Makandal, Boukman and his other lieutenants (Biassou, Jean-François, Jeannot, and Toussaint) would set raids against northern areas in the country where white French plantation owners were settled like Acul, Limbé, Flaville, Le Normand. He and his cohorts set on fire factories, fields, property, and would kill every white person that they encountered, babies, young or old along their route.
Once again, what made Boukman important and powerful as a community leader was his supposed supernatural power thanks to Vodou. He was a Houngan. The slaves would follow Boukman, many of them blindly, because against the weight of the intelligent and well-structured powers and institutions of the colonizer in the territory of Saint-Domingue, they had a liberating counterforce. Vodou and the natural leadership of Boukman represented that counterforce. So the community of slaves followed suit.
After Boukman was captured and killed, his former lieutenants would go on with the struggle for Haiti's independence. Most of them were ruthless, but virtually all of them were supposed to have been protected by the gods of Africa and were also all mired in Vodou at one level or another.
The most famous of all of Boukman's lieutenants was Toussaint Louverture. Toussaint was not just a community leader, but a national leader. He started showing off his leadership skills as a plantation manager for his former master at his Bréda habitation, south of then Cap Français in the North. A very rational man by all accounts, he grew up in stature to be recognized as the genius of Haiti's independence movement.
Toussaint's success was not due simply to his talent as a diplomat against the French colonizers, the British and the Spaniards who were all trying to control Saint-Domingue. He was able to eventually have effective control of the entire colony and even become Governor-General, because the masses saw in him a figure larger than life, someone with the capacity to read through people better than anyone else could. In the historical novel of Richard Gillespsie, Papa Toussaint, he wrote that Toussaint's "eyes caught every gesture, every facial expression. His mind registered every indication of nervousness, every change from the ordinary. The blacks who followed him were convinced that Toussaint had the power of second sight as a gift from Papa Légba. Most found it impossible to conceal their feelings from him and learned to trust his capacity to forgive rather than attempt to lie to him. The gift of truth seeing was of great value to Toussaint. It often saved him from falling into ambuscades, both political and military"
Toussaint's ability to read through people was considered supernatural, rather than a natural gift. That was the slaves' only rational explanation for it. This obviously enhanced Toussaint's image and thus confirmed the validity of his leadership in the slave's mind. Although a devoted believer in his master's faith (Catholicism), Toussaint could not escape the faith of those he devoted his life to liberate. He eventually tried to ban the practice because he thought, Vodou kept the former slave away from his duties of working on the land, or getting engaged in some productive activity. This was at the end of his career and prior to his being deported to France where he died in prison at Fort-de-Joux.
Catholicism, and the community leaders from that church in Haiti, then Saint-Domingue
France (like the Portuguese, the English, or the Spaniards) as a catholic nation had begun full control of the territory of St-Domingue not just through administrative structure and effectiveness, but through faith as well. As the French occupied Saint-Domingue, they brought in along with them, their priests, their church, and their religious faith to both the "savage" from Africa, and the white colonizer.
The French Government back in Paris, obviously wanted a Church that was mostly accommodating, and would reinforce its domination of Saint-Domingue, rather than undermining it. They would find the appropriate priests and members of the hierarchy in the Catholic Church to be sent to Haiti to play that role. Their role in the colony was as much to preach the good words of God, as it was to make sure that peace and prosperity are maintained in accordance with the desiderata of the colonial masters. As the Catholic Church was implanted in the colony, they also attracted slaves. The catholic priests' role in this new societal structure was to train the Africans psychologically to accept the ideology of his white master and all that entailed in terms of acceptance of their new condition as slaves. They did their duty effectively. As leaders with a holy aura, they were able to depict effectively their rival religion Vodou, as sinful, demoniac, anathema to the preaching of the good word from the Great Lord. There are oral reports (mostly from High-School teachers of Haiti's history in Haiti, which I could not find any document to corroborate here in this text), that some catholic priests were spies for the colonizer. They would at time of confession encourage the slaves to pour out their souls into their hands, and tell them of all the sins that they had committed or wanted to commit against their white masters, from murder by poison to petty theft.
This proves the extent to which the community leadership assured by the Catholic Church was although negative, nevertheless effective in Saint-Domingue. Without that kind of spiritual leadership from the Catholic Church in the colony, there are no guarantees that the slaves would have remained bound in their chains for so long, until Makandal and Boukman came to challenge the wisdom of such a political and economic system.
Another way to look at the effectiveness of the Catholic Church and its leadership in the colony is through Vodou itself. Vodou as a faith or as a religion is filled with saints comparative to those of Roman Catholic. Dumballah, a Vodou saint, is associated oftentimes with St. Patrick in the Catholic Church; Erzulie a beautiful female lwa with great sensuality, is associated with the Virgin Mary; one of the most powerful of all the Saints in the Vodou religion, Papa Légba, is associated with St. Peter.
That interrelatedness between Vodou and Catholicism may be interpreted in different ways, depending on the argument and the point that one wishes to make. One almost conventional explanation for that interrelatedness is the similarity in concept between what Dumballah for instance represents in the Vodou religion, and what St. Peter represents to Catholics. Also, those lwas are nothing but intermediaries between God and humans. They had specific functions, roles, and applications in each religion. In many cases, those of the Catholic faith in Haiti are also Vodou practitioners, albeit secretly.
This kind of interrelatedness also created what is known as cultural syncretism in Haiti. It is that kind of fusion (or confusion some might say), which can only be explained through the refined prisms of both religions. Of those who pretend to be only Catholics in Haiti, many carry as well secret Vodou artifacts and even visit Vodou temples known as péristyles. Toussaint Louverture was also somehow victim of that religious syncretism.
Indeed Toussaint Louverture, considered the greatest leader of Haiti's independence, was satisfied it seems, to be compared to the great Papa Légba of the Vodou mythology. Yet, he was a devoted catholic. He thought that civilizing the former slave meant as well their rejection of their original faith and religion, and the acceptance of the white masters', Roman Catholic. Recognizing the leadership value of a religious representative in a community, Toussaint, by the time he had conquered the whole island of Hispaniola and had his new constitution written, had already secured the presence of liberal catholic priests into the country to propagate the more "civilized" religion. In fact, by the end of his reign, he tried to abolish the practice of Vodou in the territory of St-Domingue.
What is clear from this tableau of the Catholic Church in St-Domingue is the image of a church that was in a position of leadership in each one of the communities where it was established. The priest was a figure of choice and as Haiti became independent, the Church once again would occupy a favorite place in society.
Vodou, Catholic, and Protestant leaders in Haiti's community
The strength of Protestantism and its leadership role in Haiti's different communities would not begin to be felt until after the American Occupation in Haiti in the 1950's. With François Duvalier at odds with the Catholic Church and having been excommunicated by the Pope, he made it easier for the Protestant missionaries to establish their churches there.
This is a church with a different outlook. Roman Catholicism is standoffish. Protestantism on the other hand is warmer, and the religious services and sermons are more appropriate and in greater unison with the masses. Roman Catholic focused more on greater urban areas; Protestant Churches appeal more to the poor and uneducated, and moved into the towns and villages, as much as into the urban areas of the country. The pastor of the church can be a local who was trained in the study of bibles. This is a church that has reached quickly and efficiently into all different corners of the country.
The kind of leadership of the Protestant Church is also different. Most of those churches in urban areas were the only providers of basic education, literacy, to the poor and the disinherited. They thus quickly made friends and adepts in all corners. They seem to participate very efficiently in the lives of the local population and operate more independently. They have different denominations, from Baptists to Pentecostal, to Seventh Day Adventists, etc.
The successful community leadership provided by the Protestant Church in Haiti is not without its own controversy. Many have accused the pastors of the Church especially during the reign of Duvalier, as being foreign agents of United States Secret Services. This is also due to the kind of teaching of the Bible which they have provided. It wasn't surprising for instance in the early 1980's to go to a Protestant Church, and hear the pastor or one of his acolytes, encouraging the worshippers to pray God and listen to His wise words, rather than worrying about wealth and the "material things of the world". Many thus came to believe that Protestantism was nothing more than a panacea for the masses who were becoming increasingly poorer. As the leadership of the Protestant Church was preaching the good words of the Lord in their community, the focus was never about the people's social, economic, or political lives. Instead, in many instances, they resorted to compete overtly on radio programs with the Catholic Church, accusing them of being worshippers of images. That kind of preaching created much suspicion in other communities, even though all the while the Catholic Church had begun changing its focus, from being totally conservative, to developing a different wing that was already known in Latin America, called Liberation Theology.
Worse, those same pastors in the Protestant Church who preach comfort in poverty to the faithful, oftentimes lived an opulent lifestyle by Haitian standard, thanks to the generosity of their benefactors in the United States, where some of them traveled quite often.
The Protestant Church had also some positive impact on Haiti's community leadership. They opened up schools that are not in large part as elitist as the Catholic Church's , but which provide the basic lessons in literacy to many poor children in the back country who otherwise would have grown up and died illiterate. Much less centralized than the Catholics, the Protestant and especially the Pentecostal brought one faith and one view of the Bible to those who were hoping for a better, albeit future, life aggressively. Their presence is felt in most parts of the country as their leadership is sometimes quite confrontational, attacking both Vodou and the Catholic Church as devil worshippers because of their respective emphasis on lwas and saints.
What those churches have been able to accomplish is fill in a vacuum left by a State that never seemed to care much about the people, especially those in the back country. As people with little to show in terms of material achievement tend to rely more on the spiritual, the religious, to satisfy their soul and outward depravation, these religions and faith have helped the urban and rural poor sustain, and even hope for a better albeit far distant future in the heavens.
Faith, and Community Leadership in Haiti (Part 2):
Community Leadership in a modern Haiti
